Into the New Year

Well, lots of things have happened since I last posted - but I won't be able to include any pictures because my computer is not behaving at all and needs fixing. So it will just have to be me writing - though if it helps imagine me reading to you instead. Possibly less boring. Possibly.
So half of my family flew down here from the 18th to the 27th - meaning that for the first time ever our family was apart for Christmas. Weird - but definately wonderful for me. They flew in while I was still teaching and so they headed off for some diving while I finished up at the school. The plan was that I would go up and meet them and surprise them. Yeah - that plan flew out the window really fast - especially after I got to the airport and they sold the ticket (that I had reserved and paid for!) to someone else, pretty much while I was in the airport. Welcome to Honduras-style tourism. (turns out when my family arrived they had cancelled their other flight - then it was "possibly cancelled' then it was "not sure" - later it was on again.) Anyways, I ended up waiting in the airport four hours longer than planned and arrived on Roatan (Bay Island off the North Coast) as the sun was setting. Now here it is typical that when you are white you receive the "white price" - meaning that it is much inflated from what other Hondurans would pay. So when I asked how much a taxi would be to where I wanted to go I was prepared to refuse. It was expensive by Honduran standards and so I decided to wait by the side of the road and hitch hike. (This is my dutchness: stubborn + cheap = interesting decisions). Anyways, I did not even have to stick up my thumb and I got a free ride with some great scuba company passing close to where I was staying! (And yes I made sure that there was a female in the vehicle before getting in.) Half an hour later - I was with my family! We spent the next two days snorkling and diving - beautiful fish and coral and weather! Then we headed off to the Mayan Ruins of Copan for a day-and-a-half. Here we celebrated Christmas Eve - marked with many fireworks and power outages. The last two days were spent at my home in Sigua - where I showed them where I live and they met most of the people I have around me and some of my students. On the 27th they headed north for home and I headed south for Costa Rica with Katherine and Mark. Our first night was spent in San Jose watching a BULL-FIGHT! Never in my life have I seen such a ridiculous thing. 1) A bunch of males running in circles trying not to get mauled by either an angry or a very bored bull 2) A bunch of males provoking an animal (not fun to see). It was quite the spectacle - and we even got free t-shirt uniforms because Katherine with her accent convinced a lady to get us some! It's pretty sweet.
Mark ran off to climb a mountain and Katherine and I went to see the active volcano of Arenal. Unfortunately it rained the entire time - which means we never got to see the smoke or even the hot lava spewing from the top =- argh - considering our hotel was supposed to have a great view. After meeting two ladies from Britain - we aligned together and did a hanging bridge tour of the rainforest. It was amazing! Getting sick of the rain - we headed for the beach for the last few days - which included hot sun, gross humidity, and monkeys, iguanas, and some large-rat-like animal. But it was beautiful and relaxing. We just got back on the 2nd and I am still recovering.
Please pray that I can fix my computer so that 1) I can use it and 2) I can download pictures.
Happy New Year All!
\manda